Vision Zero: Portland Bureau of Transportation needs to systematically evaluate whether its safety projects reduce traffic deaths and serious injury crashes

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Summary

Traffic crashes declined after Vision Zero was adopted by City Council in 2016, but began to rise in 2020. The number of traffic fatalities hit a high of 64 in 2021, then 63 in 2022. According to preliminary data, 2023 may have been even higher, with 69 recorded deaths. Each death was someone’s loved one – a family member, friend, or colleague. Vision Zero is the City’s effort to address this issue with a commitment to reduce deaths and serious injuries resulting from traffic crashes to zero. 

In the Vision Zero Action Plan, the Portland Bureau of Transportation committed to steps to make streets safer for everyone with dedicated strategies focused on pedestrian safety. The Bureau identified Portland streets and intersections where most crashes occur and compared that with demographic data showing where the most vulnerable and underserved populations in the city live. They’ve used these data elements to help prioritize decisions on where to implement safety projects. Our audit objective was to determine if the Bureau identified and delivered these safety projects from the 2019 update to the Vision Zero Action Plan in a timely and equitable manner.

Our audit found that the Portland Bureau of Transportation partially completed these safety projects. We also found the Bureau needs to better measure outcomes of those completed safety projects. While the Bureau considers equity for their larger projects there are opportunities to use other data such as community stories to identify additional safety improvements with potential equity impacts. 

To address these issues, we recommend creating a plan to systematically evaluate completed safety projects to determine which get the desired outcomes and where Vision Zero efforts are most needed. We recommend the Bureau also install promised speed cameras to further support street safety. We also recommend the Bureau revisit its equity methodology to ensure it accounts for smaller scale improvements that could have positive equity impacts. These efforts to collect data, analyze, evaluate, and carefully track which safety projects have the most desired outcomes could help move toward Vision Zero’s goal of zero fatal and serious injury traffic crashes.

Background

Traffic deaths rose across the country between 2019 and 2021. In the United States in 2021, more pedestrians were killed in traffic fatalities than any time in nearly 40 years. In Portland, the increase in pedestrian traffic fatalities was greater than in any other form of transportation between 2019 and 2022.

Vision Zero is an international movement in traffic safety that started in Sweden in 1997. In the five years leading up to the Portland City Council adopting the Vision Zero Action Plan in December 2016 both crashes that resulted in serious injuries or fatalities increased by 27%. While traffic crashes declined after Vision Zero began in Portland, starting in 2020, they began to rise. The goal of Portland’s action plan is to bring those numbers to zero. 

Figure 1: Traffic crashes declined after Vision Zero was adopted in Portland in 2016, but serious injury crashes and traffic fatalities have been rising since 2020 

Prior to adopting Vision Zero, the Bureau had identified streets and intersections where most crashes occurred. Out of that work, the Bureau created a map of this High Crash Network: the 30 streets and 30 intersections where most crashes occurred. To this they added Census data with variables such as race and income, to display areas where these overlap with crash data. The map helps visualize where safety work should be prioritized. It shows that many of the most dangerous intersections and streets are in areas of the city with a higher concentration of low-income households and where communities of color reside.

Figure 2: Many of the most dangerous intersections and streets are in areas of Portland where a higher concentration of low-income households and communities of color reside

The Bureau made equity a major aspect of Vision Zero from the outset. It sought to create streets that are safe for all Portlanders, to travel by any means, in all areas of the city. As the Bureau moves to the Vision Zero goal of zero traffic deaths and serious injuries, they strive to ensure their work contributes to a more equitable Portland. 

A guiding principle of the Vision Zero Action Plan is that it will be guided by data. The main source of data for Vision Zero is crash data which shows how many people were killed or seriously injured in traffic crashes. The Oregon Department of Transportation creates the official record, which delays final crash data being available for Bureau reports. However, the Vision Zero team also tracks fatal crash data directly from the Portland Police Bureau’s Major Crash Team, who investigate serious or fatal crashes. This preliminary data from the Police allows Vision Zero staff to fulfill their commitment to produce an annual fatality report and to present findings to council. Once final data is received from the state, staff makes it available on an interactive dashboard displaying where crashes happened, what the outcome was, and if the person was walking, biking, or driving.

The Bureau of Transportation updated the Vision Zero Action Plan in 2019, the same year they adopted a new strategic plan, further embedding safety into their work and culture

In 2019, the Bureau of Transportation updated both their Strategic Plan and the Vision Zero Action Plan. Both documents have a strong focus on safety. Staff reported the updated Action Plan concentrated more on actions under the Bureau’s control that could help move towards the goal of zero traffic deaths and serious injuries. 

Safety is the first of three core goals listed in the Strategic Plan and mirrors the goal of Vision Zero in striving to make the streets safe for all. Safety is also embedded in the bureau’s Vision, Mission, and Values. The Strategic Plan states that one tool to keep the Bureau focused on their vision is to fulfill the goals of the Vision Zero Action Plan. 

Another important step towards incorporating safety into the culture of the Bureau’s work was the adoption of a Safe Systems approach. Safe Systems provides a shift in the way people, politicians, and planners are meant to view traffic fatalities and serious injuries. The approach is based on the idea that traffic deaths and serious injuries are not inevitable but are unacceptable and preventable. In the event there is a crash, the system should be built to lessen any impact as the human body cannot take much force prior to serious injury or death. 

Along with emphasizing the Safe Systems approach, staff reported a key difference between the original Vision Zero Action Plan and the 2019 update was the Bureau’s shift to focus more on what they could control. This move, along with other entities like the Oregon Department of Transportation having control over some of the most dangerous streets in every geographic quadrant of Portland (i.e., SE Powell Blvd, SW Barbur Blvd, N and NE Lombard St), creates a tension between safety projects that the Bureau implements on streets it controls and the goal of Vision Zero to bring deaths and serious injuries to zero on all streets in Portland. 

Because of these significant shifts in the 2019 update of the Vision Zero Action Plan, we decided to use it to determine Bureau progress on Vision Zero efforts. We relied on the Bureau’s self-reporting for the status of completed projects.

Audit Results

Actions from the updated Vision Zero Action Plan were partially completed

The Portland Bureau of Transportation reports mixed results completing the actions it committed to in the 2019 Update of the Vision Zero Action Plan, completing some while not completing others. For example, the Bureau had great success in changing signal timing to make it safer to cross some streets, surpassing its targets each year since 2019. But in other areas, like speed cameras, the Bureau fell short with most cameras not placed in the planned timeframe. Some of the corridor-wide safety projects were also not completed in the years targeted. Progress on some actions was constrained by factors outside of the Bureau’s control, such as effects stemming from the global pandemic, State control over setting speed limits, and limited funding. The Vision Zero team mentioned how within these constraints, they look to insert safety components into larger projects which were already funded and planned, or in progress. 

The Vision Zero Action Plan is grouped into four strategies: 

 1. Protect pedestrians

 2. Reduce speeds citywide

 3. Design streets to protect human lives; and, 

 4. Create a culture of shared responsibility. 

Each of these strategies list objectives with specific actions tied to them. For example, under the strategy Protect pedestrians, one objective was to change signal timing and operations to make it safer to cross the street. Actions under this objective included installing pedestrian head starts, where pedestrians are given a ‘head start’ on turning traffic that is held by a longer-timed red light. We did not evaluate projects in support of the Bureau’s strategy for creating a culture of shared responsibility because, while some actions in this strategy were easy to count, the actual outcomes were not (such as whether street team outreach events or message signs near locations of fatal crashes change the driving habits of individuals). Some also relied on groups outside of the Bureau, such as community organizations and the Police.

Figure 3: The Bureau reported completing more actions in some strategy areas than in others

Under the strategy to protect pedestrians, the Bureau made some pedestrian safety improvements but did not add as much lighting or crosswalks as they anticipated

The strategy to protect pedestrians contains more actions the Bureau committed to than any of the other strategies in the Vision Zero Action Plan. Many of the actions supporting this strategy were grouped into objectives focused on making it easier for drivers to see pedestrians crossing streets – from changing signal timing, to adding street lighting, and providing crossings in-between intersections to try and prevent mid-block crashes.

The Bureau installed more pedestrian head starts than planned due in part to extra funding from TriMet. Pedestrian head starts are the term the Bureau uses when they change the signal timing at dangerous intersections to pause turning vehicles and give pedestrians more time to get into the crosswalk where they are more visible.  While the Bureau has done well at fulfilling some of its commitments to protect pedestrians by making it safer to cross the street by changing the signal timing and operations around left-turn calming, and pedestrian head starts, all of these efforts were at intersections and one quarter of all pedestrian crashes happen on stretches of road between intersections. The Bureau reported falling short on the objective to fill the gaps between safe street crossings.

The Bureau also reported that it was not as successful in adding street lighting as it planned – they did not finish installing lighting on two high crash corridor streets identified in the 2019 Action Plan Update, or complete layout plans for East Portland High Crash Network streets. The Bureau noted this was due in large part to the pandemic, reduced contracting capacity, hiring freezes, and supply chain issues. However, the Bureau did come up with a plan to fund the installation of more lights using the savings from switching to LED bulbs on existing lights, which the Bureau reports Council approved. This should help install new lighting on the High Crash Network streets as promised in the 2019 update. More lighting may help in that 70% of all traffic fatalities on Portland streets, between 2019 and 2022, were in lowlight conditions.

The Bureau has fulfilled part of its strategy to reduce speeds citywide, but could do more to enforce speed limits

The Bureau reports having done well in its strategy to reduce speeds citywide. For instance, they have gained control from the state to set lower speeds on many of the city’s streets. The one area where they have fallen short in this strategy is in the installation of promised speed cameras, which help in the enforcement of speed limits, one of the objectives under this strategy.

Excess speed is a major factor in fatal crashes. By slowing speeds, both the likelihood and intensity of crashes are reduced. The chance of pedestrian fatalities is also reduced when vehicles are travelling at slower speeds. While the Oregon Department of Transportation sets speed limits for the state, the city gained control over some local speed-setting in the 2017 legislative session and began changing signs soon after. The Bureau has reduced most residential speed limits to 20 miles per hour. In extreme cases, state law allows the city to make emergency speed limit reductions, which it did in 2021, lowering the speed to 30 miles per hour (from 35 and 40) along a stretch of NE Halsey, designated as a high crash street, part of the High Crash Network. 

Enforcement is an important component in reducing speeds. The National Highway Transportation Safety Administration determined that fixed photo speed cameras are an effective countermeasure to reducing speeding-related crashes, deaths, and injuries. The Bureau, however, reported they have not installed the number of cameras committed to which could impact the City’s efforts to enforce those safer speeds. 

The Bureau had installed eight speed cameras by 2021 with four more planned by late 2021 on SE Stark at 122^nd and 148^th. Those cameras were delayed due to prolonged contract negotiations as well as pandemic-related disruptions, according to the Bureau. More cameras are planned after the four on SE Stark.

The Portland Police Bureau is a necessary partner in the enforcement of the city’s speed limits. The Police are responsible for reviewing the camera images and determining the violation. The contract with the camera vendors, which is co-managed by the Bureau of Transportation and the Police Bureau, allows those who receive tickets to attend a safety class for a reduced fee, which is helpful for those less able to afford the fine.

The Bureau completed many of the safety design actions supporting its strategy to design streets to protect human lives

The bureau did well in most of its strategy to design streets to be safer for everyone. Several corridor-wide projects along High Crash Network streets were noted in the 2019 Update to the Vision Zero Action Plan, with the Bureau reporting most of the projects being completed on time. The left-turn calming pilot project – a combination of small, hardened rubber speed bumps that go up to crosswalks some with a ‘nose’ piece that sticks into the intersection to help prevent drivers turning left from hitting other road users – was successful in its implementation. The initial report found that speeds of turning vehicles were reduced and turning angles were increased adding more visibility and protection for pedestrians. The actual effect on safety, however, will need a few more years of data to effectively evaluate.

Traffic can be slowed, and different modes of transportation can be separated, by intentional design of streets, creating a safer environment for all to get around. The Bureau has focused on efforts to transform streets and install calming measures, but more evaluation is needed to identify opportunities for implementing the safety elements that are most successful at resulting in desired outcomes. 

Even prior to the adoption of Vision Zero, staff reported the Bureau had been using road design to help reduce speeds without lowering speed limits. Design elements such as repurposing travel lanes for in-lane parking, bike or transit lanes, or center turn lanes as well as hard structures like physical barriers and speed bumps, all work to slow traffic.

The following corridor-wide projects were included in the 2019 update to the Vision Zero Action Plan for corridor-wide safety improvements on High Crash Network streets:

• NE 102^nd Avenue (NE Weidler Street to NE Sandy Boulevard)
• NE Glisan Street (NE 112^nd Avenue to NE 162^nd Avenue)
• NE Marine Drive (NE 33^rd Avenue to NE 185^th Avenue)
• SE Foster Street (SE 50^th Avenue to SE 90^th Avenue)
• SE Division Street (SE 80^th Avenue to SE 174^th Avenue)
• SE/NE 112^nd Avenue (SE Foster Road to NE Marine Drive)
• SW Capitol Highway (SW Garden Home Road to SW Taylors Ferry Road; SW Huber Street to SW Kerr Parkway)

The Bureau reported that more than half of these projects were completed in the expected timeframe, while the others were delayed due to issues stemming from the pandemic. These issues included hiring freezes, split staffing, and supply chain delays.

Each safety project, whether a large corridor-wide one, such as the Outer Division Safety Project, or smaller installations such as left-turn calming bumps, needs to be analyzed and evaluated. Such evaluations should occur before, after and at continuous intervals after completion, to see which ones are helping to make the streets safer for all, regardless of the mode of transportation. 

The Bureau should improve evaluation and monitoring of completed safety projects

The Bureau’s policies and plans state that performance measures should be developed for evaluating overall transportation system performance and that studies should be done comparing safety before and after projects are implemented. Staff indicated this isn’t always done. Continuous monitoring of completed projects and the collecting and analyzing of performance data are best practices to determine whether projects are meeting their desired outcomes. Inputs, actions, outputs, and outcomes should align for each safety project to demonstrate real impact on the goal of zero traffic fatalities and serious injuries. The systematic evaluation of performance data could inform Bureau decisions on how to assess and adjust safety projects that aren’t getting the desired outcomes.

The Bureau is constantly working on a variety of safety projects, but those projects are not systematically evaluated once they are completed. The projects may range from large, corridor-wide multi-year projects, to discreet, individual safety projects such as installing a sign or speed bump. Projects are always in the pipeline, contained in the Bureau’s many plans, including the overarching Transportation System Plan.  Since Council adopted the Vision Zero Action Plan in December 2016, the Bureau has tried to protect pedestrians and make city streets safer for all – by reconfiguring roads, and adding high visibility signalized crossings, and pedestrian head starts – especially along the High Crash Network streets. However, we found confusion within the Bureau as to what constitutes a Vision Zero project. It would help stakeholders to show more clearly which projects fall under Vision Zero, helping achieve the goal of zero traffic fatalities and serious injury crashes. While Vision Zero staff have completed in-depth reports for the Bureau, updated the counts of safety components listed within the commitments in the Action Plan (i.e., number of speed cameras, number of pedestrian head starts, etc.), and analyzed a left turn calming pilot project, the Bureau does not conduct routine, systematic evaluations on completed safety projects. 

Without systemic evaluation of safety outcomes, the Bureau is missing the opportunity to create more alignment between the work they do on safety projects and the overall goal of Vision Zero. A more systematic approach would allow trends to be identified and analyzed to better understand the outcomes of completed projects, and which may need to be altered or dropped. As traffic deaths continue to increase it is vital that the Bureau consistently evaluate completed safety projects so they can see which are working best at shifting the trend towards the intended goal of zero traffic deaths and serious injuries.

The Bureau considers equity for major projects but could do more to identify smaller-scale safety improvements with equity impacts

The Bureau has been prioritizing and funding major projects in a more equitable manner by focusing on streets that have both the highest number of crashes and run through areas of the city with higher concentrations of low-income households and populations of communities of color. At the same time, that focus may allow smaller safety projects with possible equitable outcomes that may lay outside of those areas, or those streets, to be missed. The Bureau designed an equity matrix as a tool to help prioritize projects. However, these large corridor-wide projects – which incorporate many safety elements – can take years to complete while at the same time, demographics may shift, or people may move in and out of these areas within the course of their daily activities.

The equity matrix uses Census data for race, ethnicity, and income to create a composite score for each census tract. Those that score an eight or higher (out of 10) are considered a high-equity area, representing higher concentrations of people of color and lower household incomes. Vision Zero uses a combination of crash data and the score from the equity matrix to more equitably prioritize where to make investments in safety infrastructure.  In the five years between 2017 and 2021 the Bureau estimates 65% of capital safety project spending on High Crash Network streets occurred in areas which scored highly on their equity matrix. 

Traffic fatality statistics show the importance of investing in safety projects in these areas that scored higher on the equity matrix, most of which fall in the eastern part of the city. East Portland is home to most of the deadliest streets and intersections in the city, which makes it less safe to walk in that section of the city. Not only are pedestrians in East Portland more than twice as likely to be killed in a traffic crash than those walking in other areas of the city, but the majority of all traffic fatalities also occur east of the Willamette River. Crash data shows that traffic fatalities to community members living in the areas scoring higher on the equity matrix have steadily increased, from 27 people in 2019 to 42 in 2022. 

Figure 4: Traffic fatalities in areas of Portland with a higher concentration of low-income households and where communities of color reside increased from 2019 to 2022

The Bureau acknowledges that the equity matrix covers only the most concentrated areas of where lower income, Black, Indigenous and people of color community members reside. While crash data shows that between 2019 and 2022 most traffic fatalities, and traffic fatalities to community members living in the higher scoring areas on the Bureau’s equity matrix, occurred on High Crash Network streets, 22% of traffic fatalities to persons living in those higher scoring areas died on streets outside of the High Crash Network. 

Figure 5: Twenty-two percent of traffic fatalities occurred in areas where lower-income and BIPOC community members reside, on streets outside of the High Crash Network between 2019 and 2022 

During this review, auditors participated in multiple Walking in My Shoes tours, a program of Word is Bond. This organization empowers young Black men in Portland. The walking tours are led by youth ambassadors involved in the program. Two ambassadors addressed transportation safety needs for their communities while one of the tours demonstrated the fluidity of people across government boundaries:

• One youth ambassador lives and goes to school East of 82^nd Avenue, which lays within the area that scores higher on the Bureau’s equity matrix. However, many of his favorite places to gather with family, friends, and others in his community were West of 82^nd Avenue, outside of the higher equity index area. To reach these destinations he must cross some of the highest crash intersections in Portland, as well as a section of NE Glisan which doesn’t have clearly marked crosswalks.
• Another tour guide, living in outer SE Portland, specifically called for more traffic barriers in residential neighborhoods to increase safety on the streets.
• It was apparent that these young men displayed a strong love and connection to their neighborhood, city, and community.

As evidenced by the Walking in My Shoes tours, there are many dynamics at play within the city that impact where people live, play and congregate, which present more opportunities for equitable safety improvements if other sources of data, such as community stories, are used. The current methodology for incorporating equity in its decision-making may prevent the Bureau from considering other opportunities to address safety needs equitably, such as smaller-scale improvements that may evolve out of these other sources.

Recommendations

Even with the safety projects implemented by the Bureau in the span of the 2019 update of the Vision Zero Action Plan, there were more traffic fatalities in 2023 than either 2022 or 2021. Couple this with limited transportation funding, and it becomes more imperative that the Bureau of Transportation continuously collect data, analyze, evaluate, and carefully monitor which safety projects help the most to reach the goal of zero fatal and serious injury traffic crashes.We recommend the Bureau:

1. Create a plan that ties safety projects to expected outcomes to determine which get the desired outcomes and where Vision Zero efforts are most needed. 
   1. Plan should lay out systematic evaluation and continuous monitoring of completed safety projects.
   2. Results of evaluations should be used to assess effectiveness of project and if any alterations, in design or funding, should be implemented. 
2. Install promised speed cameras using prior contract experience and established partnership with Portland Police Bureau to fully utilize speed cameras as tools that support safety. Implementation should also include more equitable educational opportunities and alternative outcomes for violators.
3. Ensure it accounts for other data sources that could help identify smaller-scale improvements that could have positive equity impacts. 

The Deputy City Administrator for Public Works and the Director of Transportation agreed with our recommendations

We provided this report to the Mayor, City Administrator, Deputy City Administrator for Public Works, and the Bureau of Transportation. The Deputy City Administrator for Public Works and the Director of the Bureau of Transportation jointly responded on behalf of the City and agreed with our audit recommendations. 

How we did our work

The objective of this audit was to determine if the Portland Bureau of Transportation identified and delivered safety projects from the Vision Zero Action Plan 2019 Two-year Update in a timely and equitable manner. There were three sub-objectives under this:

1. Did the Portland Bureau of Transportation deliver corridor-wide safety projects on High Crash Network streets listed in the Vision Zero Action Plan two-year update?
2. Did the Portland Bureau of Transportation deliver pedestrian safety projects identified in the Vision Zero Action Plan two-year update?
3. Did the Portland Bureau of Transportation reduce speed limits and install speed safety cameras as identified in the Vision Zero Action Plan two-year update?

We scoped the time frame to match the Vision Zero Action Plan Two-Year Update (2019), which was 2019 to 2021, since PBOT was using that document as its driving document for Vision. We decided to add 2022 data as it became available during the audit, and we wanted to match numbers PBOT had presented to City Council.

To accomplish our objectives, we:

• Interviewed Bureau staff from multiple divisions and workgroups, including: Vision Zero staff and managers; Safety, Speed, Crash, and Camera analysts; Bureau Equity managers; and others from the financial services, capital projects, and traffic systems and operations work groups.
• Toured sections of two corridor projects from the Action Plan with Project Manager, City Engineer, Vision Zero/Bureau Safety Manager, and the Capital Projects Manager.
• Observed the Traffic Operations Center.
• Reviewed plans, reports, studies, rules, policies, best practices and other audits, including: the City’s Comprehensive Plan, Transportation Chapter; PBOT’s Strategic Plan; Federal, state and local transportation studies among many others.
• Interviewed outside stakeholders including The Street Trust and Oregon Walks.
• Participated in multiple ‘In My Shoes’ tours led by Word is Bond teen ambassadors.
• Reviewed and analyzed crash data from within the audit scope. We also reviewed historical crash data.

We conducted this performance audit in accordance with generally accepted government auditing standards. Those standards require that we plan and perform the audit to obtain sufficient, appropriate evidence to provide a reasonable basis for our findings and conclusions based on our audit objectives. We believe that the evidence obtained provides a reasonable basis for our findings and conclusions based on our audit objectives.

Audit Team

Bob MacKay, Senior Performance Auditor